The Songbird and the Heart of Stone (Crowns of Nyaxia #3)

Chapter 41

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

W e traveled in a death march to the end, hours blending together. The terrain slowly shifted around us, the trees eventually giving way to dunes of white sand, which in turn soon shifted to rippling fields of grass—all of it rendered in mournful shades of silver, a ghost version of the mortal world. It was impossible to tell how long we walked. There was no moon to rise or fall, no markers to gauge the passing of time save for the bounds of our own exhaustion. We slept when we were too tired to go on, and continued walking the moment we woke.

There were no more kisses, no more trysts, even though every time we lay down, our awareness of each other was agonizing. I could feel Asar’s eyes on me constantly, and when he slept, I traced the lines of his body, too. But I couldn’t let those walls down for him again. Not with Atroxus watching, his hand over Asar’s throat.

This wasn’t like the other legs of our journey. Something had shifted in a way that neither of us could—or would—name.

In every spare moment we had, Asar pushed me to practice my magic. It was constant, and he was an even tougher instructor than usual, his patience stretched thin.

“I know you know how to do this,” he snapped one night, after I fumbled a thread of shadow that he kept passing me as we walked, asking me to manipulate it into more and more intricate arrangements. “I’ve seen you do far more. Stop stifling yourself.”

I let my hands drop to my sides, staring hard at the gray ground as we walked. “I’m not stifling myself.”

I just couldn’t focus. My Shadowborn magic felt wrong in all the ways it felt right. Every time I let it slide under my skin, I heard Atroxus’s voice—damning me, and worse, damning Asar.

I didn’t want to tempt that fate.

Asar stopped short, turning so fast I almost went stumbling into him. His scarred eye flared.

“I know you too well for that now, Mische,” he said. “Yes, you are.”

A flare of frustration rose up in me, quickly tamped down beneath my hopelessness.

I gave him a weak, painfully fake smile. “I’ll just have to try harder.” I tried to push past him, but he angled himself in front of me, forcing me to look at him.

“We are about to attempt one of the greatest feats of Shadowborn magic ever to be recorded,” he said. “It will be dangerous. You need to be able to do this.”

The note of desperation in his voice made me pause. Not frustration. Not the chiding of a teacher with a student who wasn’t applying herself.

Desperation.

I stared hard at him.

“You’re the necromancer. This is your ceremony.”

He said nothing.

“Can you please just tell me what the ominous silence is for?” I said.

The corner of his mouth twitched, but there was no joy in the expression.

“I wasn’t going to say anything unless I knew you could do it.”

Dread rose in my stomach. “You weren’t going to say anything about what?”

“I’ll need your help. To conduct the ritual.”

I blinked. My eyes went wide.

Necromancy was taboo, yes, but it was also notoriously difficult. Even when I’d watched Asar set up his ceremony for Chandra what felt like a lifetime ago, I’d been able to feel the complexity of it.

“You want me to help you do the resurrection? I’m—” I rasped an awkward laugh. “I’ve only been wielding Shadowborn magic for what, a few months?”

“But you’re talented. And more valuable than that, you’ve spent your entire life studying magic. Your technique is perfect. It’s obvious every time I see you work. You just…?understand it.” The curl to his lips had returned. If I wasn’t too busy trying not to keel over at the thought of performing necromancy, I might have felt something warm in my heart that Asar was talking about me with such admiration. I knew by now that nothing meant more to Asar than someone who was truly committed to their art, and it was nice to know that he thought I fit that description.

“But why?” I asked.

Asar took a long moment to answer. “This journey has taken more of a toll on me than I wanted to admit. You saw how I struggled to even close the gates in Morthryn alone. I needed your help then. I’ll need it for this, too.”

I was silent.

My limbs felt heavy, exhaustion weighing on me. The glow from the arrow still pulsed bright enough to seep through the seams of Asar’s pack.

I’d help drag Alarus back to life, only to kill him. And I’d have to do all of it while connected to Asar, our magic shared, our souls intertwined in that uncomfortable intimacy. I’d have to feel his reaction as I betrayed him.

I could handle impossible magical feats. But this almost brought me to my knees.

For a moment, the desire to tell Asar everything overwhelmed me. The worst part was, I didn’t even think he would blame for me for any of it. I could imagine his sigh of exasperation, his clenched jaw of concern on my behalf. And then he would set his sights to righting these wrongs, just as he did in the halls of Morthryn.

But I could now feel Atroxus’s eyes on me in perpetual watch. The walls I’d constructed to protect Asar from the consequences of my actions were so feeble that a strong gust of wind could destroy them. If I blatantly disobeyed Atroxus’s only stipulation, Asar would be the one to pay for it, and I would not allow that to happen.

So I drew in a breath and let it out.

“When I boarded that ship to Obitraes,” I said, “I never thought that eventually, I’d be doing gods-damned necromancy.”

Asar’s mouth curved in a smile that, despite everything, made -every wrong in the world feel manageable.

“I thought you liked adventures. This is the greatest one you’ll ever take. Besides.” He brushed a stray hair behind my ear. “Can’t think of anyone better suited to master both the sun and the stars, Iliae.”

The air grew so unbearably still, as if the Descent itself was holding its breath in wait for what was to come. We didn’t encounter a single other being—not Ophelia, not wraiths, not souleaters. Even Luce was now always quiet, the wisps of shadow at the back of her neck wiggling as if her hackles were perpetually raised.

“We’re getting close,” Asar said one day as we paused our drills to stop and look out over the distant horizon. “I can feel it.”

I could feel it, too. Fate creeping up behind us.

Sure enough, the next day we reached the door.

We were hiking through rocky bluffs, exhausted after hours of travel, when we crested a hill and stopped short.

“Oh, gods,” I whispered.

Asar let out a long breath of amazement.

A field of red poppies spread out before us, an endless blanket in all directions. They were searingly bright in a world of grays and silvers, so much so that it hurt my eyes after what felt like ages seeing no color at all. But gods, were they stunning—rippling against an invisible breeze, stretching off over the rolling hills, painting the entire landscape in blood.

A doorway stood in the center of that field.

The passage to the Sanctum of Soul.

The boundary between the Descent and the underworld.

The end of it all.

A lump rose in my throat. Funny that we’d spent gods knew how long traveling toward this spot and yet, now that we were here, it felt like an unpleasant surprise.

“That’s it?” I said.

“That’s it.”

What else was there to say?

We started to make our way down the hill. The poppies were tall, nearly brushing my knees, and so soft. I held out my hand to touch them as I went.

Halfway across, Asar paused. He looked to the door. To the horizon. And then back to me. A gentle breeze rolled over the flower petals, sending his hair rustling and dousing me in the scent of flowers and him.

He offered me his hand.

“Let’s sit here.”

I frowned, gaze sweeping over him. “Why? Are you all right?”

“I’m all right. I just want to sit for a minute.”

My frown deepened. “But we haven’t been walking very long. And you don’t usually like to rest. Or do anything fun.”

“To think I actually thought you liked me, Dawndrinker.”

“Well, Warden, I just speak the truth.”

Asar settled down in the flowers, leaning back on his palms and gazing up at me. “Sit. You’re too impatient.”

I was impatient. The moment I saw that door, I felt like insects were crawling under my skin. On the other side, everything I knew would collapse. I just wanted to rush through it. Get it all over with.

And the way Asar was looking at me, that soft smile on his lips, was making this all too difficult.

“Sit with me,” he said again.

The way he said it reminded me of how I had sounded as I asked him, Stay with me.

A lump in my throat, I obeyed. His shoulder brushed mine, the warmth of his body unbearable. Luce circled us, snapping at the silver butterflies rising through the flowers like smoke. In the sky, the faint ghost of the path we had traveled still hung over us, distant rivers of blood and mountains of stone and circling souleaters. Utter peace here, in the center of so much chaos.

It was one of the most beautiful things I’d ever seen.

“You know,” Asar said softly, “it’s very possible that no other living mortal has ever witnessed this sight.”

And gods, what a sight it was.

“When I told Raihn that I was leaving the House of Night, I said it was because I wanted to see the world.” I laughed. “I didn’t mean the underworld. I meant the Lotus Islands, or something. But this…?this is definitely more impressive.”

“You’ll have quite a story for him.”

My smile faded. The thought of Raihn made my heart ache.

I was no fool. I knew I would probably never get the chance to tell him this wild tale. I hoped he never learned what happened to me. I hoped he would just go on forever thinking that I was off living my adventures, seeing all there was to see.

“Mhm,” I said. “He’ll love it.”

Another breeze. The scent of ivy rolled over me. I drew it deep, holding it in my lungs.

“When you came to Obitraes,” he said softly, “you came to preach the light to vampires.”

I smiled weakly. “I’m not new to impossible missions.”

It didn’t feel right to joke about it, even after all these years.

But there was no joke in Asar’s voice.

“I was born a vampire. I’ve never known the sunlight. What does it feel like?”

I closed my eyes. For a time, I’d feared I was forgetting what the sun had felt like. Now, for some reason, the recollection came to me so easily.

“It feels like waking up rested after a long nap. Or like going to sleep knowing you’ll awaken safely. It feels warm and comforting. A fresh dawn makes you believe that the future can be better than the present.”

Strange that when I closed my eyes, it wasn’t the dawn that came to mind as I described these things.

“I imagine,” Asar said, “that it feels the way music sounds. Like joy for the sake of it. Maybe it feels like hope.”

“Yes,” I whispered. “It’s exactly like that.”

“Hm.” His touch, gentle as nightfall, fell over my hand. I wouldn’t look at him, wouldn’t turn to face him, but I felt his breath against my ear.

“You have given me all of that,” he murmured. “So you have succeeded in your impossible mission, Dawndrinker. And I’m deeply honored that I had the opportunity to walk this path with you. Thank you.”

I didn’t like that he was talking this way. It all felt so damned close to a goodbye. I forced myself to meet his eyes, saw him drinking me in like his final sip of wine.

I drank him in, too—this man whom I’d come to see so much of myself in. This man who devoted himself eternally to righting wrongs and fixing the broken things that no one else cared about. This man who saw light in the darkness and heard music in the silence.

For a moment, I saw a glimpse of all that he could be, would be, once this was all over, and the thought that I would not get to see those things was devastating.

“I think you’re going to be an incredible king,” I said. “I think you make the world better.”

And as we sat there in the field at the precipice of death, I kissed him, long and gentle and full of the truth I couldn’t say. I didn’t even care if the sun was watching.

We remained there, soaking up our final moments, for a long time.

And then we closed the chapter just as easily. We rose, we gathered our things. We straightened our scant armor and donned our weapons. Asar gave me one final kiss on the forehead and wound his fingers through mine.

And we passed through the doorway to the final Sanctum, sending our souls to hell.